


Pandemonium

by evisionarts



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Inception Fusion, Dreamsharing, M/M, Rock Stars, dragon saito
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-07-11
Packaged: 2018-07-22 22:37:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7456558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evisionarts/pseuds/evisionarts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur played with deadly competence, keeping the audience grounded in their seats and desperate to learn what comes next. Eames’ bass twined around his structure, expanding the theme and urging every heart to beat a little faster and every lung to breathe more deeply of the poisoned air. Ariadne wove ever more fanciful dreamscapes that settled deep into the people’s heads until they could no longer remember who they were or where they came from. And Dom the Magister controlled them all, the impression of his fingers always there against the fiber of their collars.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pandemonium

It burned like a flaming sword of Hell every damn time. Arthur never got used to it. The pain arced through his chest like a fucking harpoon forcing its way into his stuttering heart and wrenching it free. 

Arthur refused to scream. He waited still and silent in the darkness until the fire in his body eased and the air started to clear. His pupils widened from feline slit to rich black ovals and the blood drained from his eyes until they faded to a deep brown. His elegant wings folded away into nothingness and his pointed tale lashed once then curled and was gone. 

Arthur shivered into his human form until it fit him like a tailored glove then scowled and surveyed this new location.

He stood before a thick red velvet curtain and reached out with long, slim fingers to create a narrow gap. The venue was larger than usual. The stage was huge and high and surrounded by tiered benches that rose to the ceiling in a steep slope. Every spot was filled and the crowd swayed with restless energy, murmuring in a low furtive hum.

Arthur’s hands clenched into fists, the short blunt nails dragging against his skin with that familiar sensation of distinctive wrong. He bared his perfect white teeth and mourned the loss of razor sharp incisors as a final spike of heat shot through him, settling into a dull ache. 

Arthur was here, he was contained and he was fucking angry.

Arthur cast his disgruntled gaze down and breathed in relief at the gleaming titanium guitar case that lay at the toe of his perfectly polished wingtips. He caressed the lock with reverent fingers and crooned the discordant lines of a complicated and highly customized enchantment until the mechanism popped with a soft sigh of release. He eased open the top to find the sleek black instrument that lay snug and safe in a bed of soft grey velvet.

Arthur lifted his guitar from its nest and cradled it close to his wiry body, striking a ringing chord. He breathed out a hum that mirrored the pitch while his haughty gaze swept the stage for signs of Eames’ imminent arrival.

Arthur always looked for Eames first. It made sense, Arthur controlled the melody line but Eames set the rhythm. Tonight could be slow and languid or hard and rough but either way it would never work without them playing in sync.

Eames burst from the portal in a shower of sparkling glitter. He filtered through in a lazy series of beats; first a crooked Cheshire Cat grin then a cloud of delicate glowing glyphs that sank into the scarred skin of his broad chest. The bulging muscles of his thighs were wrapped in a swath of purple paisley and his feet were bare. He clung to his tight, coiled horns and long thin tail tipped with spikes until the very last moment before letting them go with a mournful grunt.

Eames clutched a bass guitar in the shape of a bright pink ax and petted at the strings. He hummed with delight upon spotting Arthur. “Darling!”

Arthur scowled even as his cheeks flushed with a faint rosy hue. “Mr. Eames.”

Eames’ gaze swept hungrily up Arthur’s trim body. He lingered on the leather trousers cut so close they fit like a second skin. He nodded approvingly at the diamond patterned waistcoat and crisp white shirt then growled at the sight of the thin black cord wrapped securely around Arthur’s slender neck. Eames stopped himself from reaching up and touching his own well-worn collar.

“It’s about time.” Dom Cobb stepped from the shadows and squinted irritably between them. “Next time I won’t be so gentle.”

“Magister Cobb I have such great stuff for you!” Yusuf called from the right wing of the stage. He stood in front of a stark, white table fiddling with an array of bubbling vials and added a quiet mumble to himself. “You won’t believe how good my chemicals are tonight.”

Dom eyed Yusuf with a distinct air of suspicion then turned back to the stage. “Where’s Ariadne?”

“I’m here.” Ariadne wafted in, her face a cheerful mask though pale from the strain. The points of her ears softened into roundness and her gauzy, iridescent wings folded themselves away and disappeared. An intimidating array of keyboards, monitors and synthesizers materialized around her. “I’m ready.”

“You better be.” Dom favored her with a malevolent glower. 

Ariadne rolled her eyes. “You’re more than welcome to take over if I’m not living up to your expectations.” She scratched beneath the cord looped around her thin neck.

“I can’t.” Dom paced back and forth growling, waving his hands and shooting sparks into the air. “I’m on the drum kit tonight. Nash won’t be joining us now … or ever.”

Eames crossed thick arms over well-defined pecs. “And what has befallen our beloved comrade-in-arms?”

Dom sighed. “Saito ate him.”

Eames threw back his head and roared with laughter, then clapped his hands with delight and turned to Arthur. “Pet, did you hear that? Nash poked the dragon.”

Arthur showed a peek of dimples as his mouth quirked into a half-smile and Eames cheeks flushed with victory. Ariadne coughed and hid a giggle behind her hands while Yusuf clinked his beakers together with glee.

“Enough,” Dom grumbled. “Be grateful I called you when I did or you might be next. Saito needs to feed and he doesn’t always care where his next meal comes from.”

“Yes we do appreciate you ripping us from our homes any time you like.” Eames’ sarcasm choked to a halt as the cord looped around his neck sparked and glowed, burning an angry line across his throat.

“Stop it Dom.” Arthur’s tone was flat and calm though his long fingers tightened on the strings of his guitar. “We can’t build a working dream if you ruin Eames voice and then Saito will have no one but you to blame.”

“Know your place.” Dom’s words were clipped and hard but Eames’ collar reversed back to black, the festering burn fading into a ring of silvered scarring.

Dom turned away then glared between Ariadne and Yusuf. “Anything you two need to say before we start?”

Ariadne opened her mouth but Yusuf talked over her with a frantic shake of his shaggy head. “No, no …no  worries here. This new formula is bitchin’! Saito will have more tasty human energy to devour than ever before.” 

He raised a vial of bubbling liquid and turned it back and forth, the light catching on the particles within, making the mixture shimmer and glitter. He threw a lazy salute in the direction of Dom’s annoyed countenance and grinned. “We’re ready to rock and roll!”

Dom sighed and pinched his nose but shuffled over behind the drum kit, settling himself and twirling a stick. He struck the skin of his drum with a jolt of force that shook the stage. “One-two ...”

A wailing chord ripped through the heavy air and the curtains parted. The frenzied roar of the crowd rose and filled the arena with a wall of hungry sound. 

Eames thrummed a pulsing bass line beneath Arthur’s controlled cadence as Ariadne joined in with a scrape of fingers over electric piano keys. Dom added to the established rhythm with a staccato tapping of his sticks against the well-cured hides of Nash’s abandoned drums. Yusuf smiled and unstoppered the first vial.

The liquid rose high into the air separating into thousands of tiny gleaming droplets then rained down upon the crowd. Heads tilted back and lips parted as the people drank greedily from the offering. Their eyes turned glassy and they stared into space, sighing and moaning as an undercurrent to the haunting refrains of the song. No one noticed the shadow of the dragon forming above them.

Saito was silent as he slinked and slithered his way through the throng. He chose his victims at random, savoring a sip here and a taste there. Bodies fell beneath the onslaught of his insatiable appetite, slipping from their seats and shriveling to grey husks as they were drained of everything they once were.

The people, drunk on Yusuf’s potions, ignored the threat wandering within their midst and reveled in their visions. They wrapped their hearts and bodies in a cocoon of pulsing music, fattened on promises of insecurities vanquished and secret desires fulfilled and left open to be fed upon by one who could never be sated.

Arthur played with deadly competence, keeping the audience grounded in their seats and desperate to learn what comes next. Eames’ bass twined around his structure, expanding the theme and urging every heart to beat a little faster and every lung to breathe more deeply of the poisoned air. Ariadne wove ever more fanciful dreamscapes that settled deep into the people’s heads until they could no longer remember who they were or where they came from. And Dom the Magister controlled them all, the impression of his fingers always there against the fiber of their collars. 

Dom didn’t give a damn about Saito or any of them. They were demons, summoned in the name of his brutal grief and bound to his whim. He only knew that if he built a dream layered with enough human energy to incite the dragon’s feeding frenzy he could keep the resulting shit storm of feedback and magic spinning and spinning with no beginning and no end. Even the vault that guarded the laws of death and time would crack under the force of his power. Dom would hold the universe hostage and force the gods to take heed of his demands.

The night his beloved and mad Mal leapt from the balcony of their tower room Dom carved a promise into his breast with a dragon’s jagged tooth as he knelt over her broken body. Mal would return to him. Or he would leave this sphere a withered shell whose inhabitants wandered forever without faith, hope or memory of the ones who made them.

The smoky tang of Dom’s insane longing slid down Arthur’s throat like a tumbler of the finest aged whisky. He knew it was wrong and the addiction was consuming him. But he was one whose calm demeanor shielded a being of infinite and chaotic complexity and the circular logic of the man’s madness tasted so good. It hid the bitterness of his slavery and encouraged him to get lost in the details of building the dreams while forgetting how it ate away at his magic leaving him exhausted and starving. Only Eames could remind him of what he once was and he mocked Arthur for it. Eames confused Arthur, could not be quantified, and Arthur hated him for that but hated his own weakness more. He was sure it was hate. What else could it be?

Eames watched Arthur stroke his guitar through slitted eyes. He licked his lips at the proud and precise movements of Arthur’s fingers and appreciated the sway of his lithe body silhouetted against the glow of the lights. 

He remembered the night he met Arthur, the first time he stood upon a stage lost, bewildered and transformed, with a cord around his neck and a desperate man claiming to be his master. He remembered the time before Yusuf, before Ariadne, when the two of them were the only things keeping a powerful and tortured soul from ripping the universe apart. He remembered conspiring with Arthur to convince Dom that building the dreams was the only way to catch the notice of the gods and force their hand. He remembered how they talked Dom into bringing in the others and how careful Arthur was to make sure they were choosing the right ones.

He remembered Arthur sensing the Magister’s growing insanity and distrust and deliberately giving himself up as a pawn to the man’s madness. He remembered Dom’s gaze, distracted by Arthur’s brilliance and loyalty, slipping away from the others on the stage. He watched Arthur’s fierce and glorious light growing dim in the shadow of one man’s selfishness and he remembered his own promise to the one he loved. He played a discordant note.

Dom didn’t notice at first but Arthur was instantly alert. Even distracted by Dom’s allure Arthur could not be fooled. Eames was counting on this. Arthur’s played a questioning riff and Eames pounced upon the change in their routine, pulling out the melody and shattering it beneath a flurry of dissonant tones. He attacked Arthur, leaving him no choice but to fight back with increasingly desperate measures. Ariadne leaped into the fray using her synthesizers to battle against Arthur’s attempts to bring the song back under his control. She threw out long ambient shards of sound that smothered the melody in smoke and fog. 

While Arthur was distracted Eames strode closer, the bass in his hands glittering with droplets of blood as he stroked the strings so hard they sliced into his finger tips. He ripped the guitar from Arthur, pushing him away as he threw it upon the floor and raised his ax in a wide curving arc only to bring it crashing down with such force both instruments shattered.

Arthur stared at Eames with a cold intensity that slowly turned to wonder. “Mr. Eames,” he said, “I am impressed.” 

The spell enchanting the arena fractured and Saito dove into the crowd and fed indiscriminately weaving a fierce path of destruction until no one was left. Dom roared at Arthur as if he were the only one Dom could see, the only thing left to blame as the dream fell apart around them taking the dragon with it.

Dom’s gaze was thunderous as he circled his players and mumbled dark whispers. He ignored the wails of agony building around him as collars glowed and the air filled with the stench of searing flesh. 

Yusuf staggered in the shadows at the edge of the stage and clawed at his throat with one hand while he shoved at his table until it tipped over onto the floor with a crash of splintering glass. He fell back on his heels writhing, scrambling to get out of the way of an elegant trail of charcoal grey fog that oozed from the shattered bottles. The dense mist whirled and shifted into a long, undulating column that wound its way toward Dom. It hung in the air before his widening eyes then shifted and coalesced into the translucent form of a sleek and stunning woman.

“Mal.” Dom intoned the name as if speaking a line of sacred text. 

“Mon amour, mon coeur …” The apparition laid a smoky hand upon Dom’s trembling cheek and brought glistening grey lips to his. “I could eat you up.”

“Yes.” Dom agreed and breathed into the kiss, whispering promises into the gaping mouth. The figure’s teeth grew long and razor sharp as its body shuddered and warped into that of a monstrous, winged serpent. Dom smiled adoringly as the creature rose up and swayed above him. The serpent peered at the man out of familiar eyes then lunged, swallowing him down whole. There was a final smile of satisfaction as the snake exploded into flames that rapidly consumed themselves and died out. 

Ariadne watched from her place on the floor in front of her keyboards then lay flat on her back and stroked her hand across her naked and unblemished throat. “Oh my god. We did it. It worked.”

Yusuf swore from the wings of the stage. “It fucking worked bitches!”

Eames opened his eyes to Arthur looming over him. “Was this your idea Mr. Eames?”

Eames smiled beatifically at Arthur’s questioning gaze. “No need to sound so surprised darling, I do have my moments. I planned the whole thing but Yusuf came up with the summoning compound and Ariadne made sure we shattered the dream at the right moment.”

“You should destroy me too.” Arthur rose to his feet and turned his back to Eames, wrapping his arms about himself and hunching his shoulders. “I helped him.”

Eames hopped up and swaggered into Arthur’s personal space, drawing the rigid body back into the circle of his arms. “Darling while I appreciate self flagellation in certain circumstances feeling sorry for yourself in this situation does not become you.”

Eames felt Arthur bristle and grinned into the nape of his neck. “There’s my Arthur. You played the hardest part pet. Dom needed to trust somebody and because he had you the rest of us were free to conspire as we pleased.”

“I may have volunteered for the role in the beginning Eames but by the end I wasn’t playing a part. I forgot there was a script!” Arthur squirmed in Eames’ grip but the arms around him only tightened.

“Arthur, darling, don’t be ridiculous. You are meticulous to a fault, you are brilliant at planning, prepared for every single contingency. And yet my break in the song caught you completely unaware? There’s no way that could happen love. Not if you didn’t want it to.”

Arthur leaned back slightly into the curve of Eames’ body.

 “You are a vicious fighter and yet you let me take your guitar without lashing out even once.” Eames flicked out the tip of his tongue and dared a gentle lick to Arthur’s ear lobe. 

Arthur sighed, finally relaxing into Eames’ arms. “I’m sorry I forgot about us.”

Eames snorted. “Darling you didn’t forget. Every time Dom tried to hurt me you spoke up. Even if it meant he turned his rage on you. Frankly it was infuriating. I can protect myself you know.”

Arthur rolled his eyes. “Someone has to stop you from getting into too much trouble with that beautiful mouth of yours.”

Eames’ tone turned smug. “You think my mouth is beautiful.”

“Um guys…” Ariadne was diverting her eyes while she and Yusuf stood off to the side looking distinctly uncomfortable. “Sorry to interrupt but we may have a problem.”

“What now?” Arthur wriggled out of Eames embrace and turned placing his hands on his hips and eyeing them with exasperation.

“Well we kind of forgot something.” Ariadne looked sheepish.

Arthur threw up his hands. “For gods’ sake what is it Ariadne?”

Yusuf huffed and jumped in. “We may not have a way to get home.”

Arthur eyed him suspiciously. “What do you mean may not?”

Yusuf shrugged. “I mean Dom was the one who opened the portals and he’s gone now so …”

Arthur rounded on Eames who backed away and threw his hands up between them. “Now darling don’t be cross. There wasn’t much time and really you’re the planner anyway so we had to make do and um it’s Yusuf’s fault!” Eames pointed at the man in question whose startled squeaks of protest were cut off as the whine of sirens filled the air.

“I swear to the gods I have to fucking think of everything!” Arthur growled at the group. “Do we at least have enough power left to clean up the arena?”

“I can do it.” Ariadne grinned. “My electronics work better here than they do at home.” She whipped out a series of notes on her keyboard ending the salvo with a flourish of her left hand and leaving them standing in the battered remains of an old warehouse. 

Eames whistled a low note of approval. “Is this world so stupid no one will notice a missing arena?”

Ariadne’s eyes flashed with mischief. “What arena? It never existed.”

“Cheeky!” Eames admonished. “I love it. Don’t you love it pet?”

Arthur frowned. “And all the dead people? Did they suddenly feel much better?”

Ariadne shrugged. “Don’t be silly Arthur. Dead is dead. Well to humans anyway. Well mostly. Anyway, they all died of natural causes. Well mostly they were eaten. It’s a bad year for sharks and crocodiles. The scientists think it has something to do with global warming.” She beamed at him.

Arthur fought the twitching of his lips and ignored the sound of Eames and Yusuf laughing hysterically. “Well, that’s … unfortunate.”

“So …” Yusuf gasped as he fought to bring his giggles under control. “What do we do now?”

They shared a few moments of silence.

“Hmmm,” Eames said scratching his head then casually stretching his arm out and hooking it around Arthur’s waist.

Arthur frowned but made no attempt to remove it. Ariadne smiled and looked politely away while Yusuf rolled his eyes.

Eames settled himself against Arthur’s side radiating smug contentment. “Well we know this world dreams.”

Ariadne nodded thoughtfully. “I wonder how much they would pay someone who knew how to get inside them?”


End file.
